Angeles Mendez Testimony for SB.21.087 (March 2021)

Main Participant

Angeles Mendez

Legislative Action

SB.21.087 ("Agricultural Workers' Rights")

Original Language

English

Transcription

[Angeles Mendez]
Hello, my name is Angeles Mendez. I live in Delta County. I’m an original organizer for Project Protect [Food Systems Workers]. I am in support of [senate] bill 21.087. Summer July 2020, thirty-year-old male, migrant worker, H2A visa holder: He comes here every year for corn harvests. He happened to get very sick. He went to, um, one of the local clinics. Unfortunately they weren’t able to do much for him, as he had visible urine in his, um, visible blood in his urine. He was sent to the ER, which they did a couple of ultrasounds, and he was diagnosed with a huge kidney stone that was blocking his urethra. Um, unfortunately, ER was not able to do anything. They referred him to the urologist. Urologist sent him to have surgery. “There is no way to break this on your own. There is no way I can break it for you.” Usually in the time of events when emergency rooms happen to make quick emergency surgeries, these times, I have to ask community members to donate money so this gentleman could have surgery. You know many of them can not get insurance, and there is no other health care around the Western Slope. So, in this situation, [unintelligible] are caused due to lack of water breaks–or breaks in general, water supply education, the importance of hydration, and the fact that more men and women have to pee–have to hold their pee for longer periods/hour because they don’t have breaks. It’s a huge concern. For this bill, I am a huge supporter of it because it will force employers to give ag. workers a better opportunity to ensure their healthcare. Having those breaks are important. You know, the ability to support their family a little better and also the ability to give those jobs to local workers–to our community members–that are in desperate need of jobs right now. So I encourage you, all of you, to support Senator Danielson and bill SB.21.087. Thank you for your time.

Translation Language (if available)

N/A

Translation

Show Translation?

Archivist Notes

Angeles gave her testimony to the Business, Labor, and Technology Committee via remote participation on March 17, 2021. The punctuation present in the transcribed part of this item are purely constructed on the part of the contributor. Mitchell has tried to mimic the authenticity of the audio recording (i.e. pauses, interruptions, etc) in a written format.